Sunday, March 29, 2009

Shaping the City of My Dream


I can shape the city of my dream through working with other young people of my age range in creating awareness about issues that are currently of significant importance to our communities, nation and world at large such as clean air, sustaining the environment through creating awareness about safe and sustainable human practices that can reduce the waste in our communities, peer-to-peer education about drugs abuse, gangs, teenage pregnancy, domestic violence that has taken our city, growing and eating locally as oppose to traveling several miles to purchase our food stuff, redirecting our consumption pattern about energy needs and always been an example about whatever I talk to my friends about. Most of the problems in my city today are associated with the issues listed above. It is my hope that through this paper, youth within my area or other communities will get to understand that today’s leadership have failed us and it is only when we take out leadership roles today through acquiring the necessary education needed to hold public, private and personal responsibilities can we effect positive change to make the city a place we all want to see it. It is now time that the youth need to stand up and stop been naïve that their governments, local community organizations, churches or our parents can make those changes that we all want to see happening in order to make life what it should be- safe!





What can I do to Shape the City of My Dream?
The city of my dream is a place where every person young and old, disabled and healthy, weak and strong, Whites, Blacks, Asians, Hispanic and can live free. It is a place where wars are not seen as legitimate processes to end violence and terrorism. It is a place where diplomatic processes with good and bad ending their differences in a peaceful and compromising manner that will eliminate violence, wars, etc. It is a place where the there is no poverty amongst its people, because everyone will be able to share their resources with the needy in a voluntary manner. It is a place where the children are considered precious stone and provided with the education that is needed to foster development and sustainability. It is a place where the poor sees himself strong and the rich sees himself stronger. It is a place that the government locally and nationally sees themselves as servants of the people, rather than they seeing the people as servants. It is a place that everyone sees himself as important as possible and there is no distinction between the rich and the poor on the line that they are all able to eat good food, drink safe and clean drinking water, have a safe, sound and comfortable house to sleep, to be able to get treatment when they all fall sick, access to public transportation, free to associate with other groups no matter their social orientation. A place where there is no distinction between a black, white and Hispanic students, a place where they all can share, respect each other and live without those negative stereotypical attitudes which lead to dislike, violence and civil unrest. A place that will always be considered sound, safe, clean and beautiful. A place that people from other cultures, nations and works of life can come and visit. A place that children can be respected and the issues of child abuse can be done away with. A place that every child, no matter your parents’ social, economic, political and ethnic background can get the require education both at the secondary and college levels. A place that freedom rings in the ears of the morning stars as the birds sing in our windows. A place you are happy to sleep at night and refreshed when you wake up from sleep. A place that the animals are not abuse, kill and destroy. A place that they live in their natural habitat without escaping human activities as a result of our crude and selfish attitudes to occupy and destroy nature and its hosts. A place that the trees, grasses and other plant species live to elongate their generation and continuously refresh, refill and protect the earth from destruction. A place that the fishes in the seas, oceans, rivers, creeks, lakes, streams, lagoons and the countless water-bodies under the sky remain safe for their lives to continue as it was before we came here. A place that the birds will only be the creature to fly and no aircraft, space ships, rockets, etc to pollute the atmosphere with all those fossil fuel gases ejected from burning jet engines. A place the air remains safe and good to sustain human existence. A city that will always flourish, because her people redefined their motives and redesigned how to use their scarce and limited resources in a sustainable manner. A city where people ride their bicycle, walk, run and talk more closely as oppose to motor vehicles, train, buses, airplane and talking on cell phones for which we have become economic slaves to these material things. We have become slaves, because we accepted those materials things to cloud our city and thus overtake us. In order to see my city this way, it is also imperative for me as well as others to act and act more quickly, precisely and concisely.
In order to create those changes that I am proposing in this essay to shape the city of my dream, it is very important for me to take the process myself and stop blaming the governments locally and nationally for effecting positive changes in my city. I do believe that from the community level, the change most come from me, since I am at the base of my city; that is, the community in which I am living. As a young person, there are several ways through which I can shape the city of my dream. One of such ways is to reduce the amount of Carbon Footprint that I am releasing into the atmosphere which is thus causing the changes in climate. One way in achieving that at my city level which also has a significant impact on shaping my city is by reducing the amount of energy that I consume every day. I can help reduce the amount of energy that I consume by not leaving my electronic material plug when I am not using them. I can also use alternative energy sources such as the solar energy, windmill or energy produce from vegetation such as grasses or waste materials. By reducing the amount of energy that I as an individual consume on a daily basis in my city, I am helping to subsequently shape the energy crisis of my city as well as the nation at large. I can also shape the city of my dream by also educating or joining with others to create awareness through a non-violent means about what, why and how we are doing those things that we are doing. By creating awareness and educating the people of my family, neighborhood, community, city, state and nation at large, I am effecting positive change which over time will have a significant impact on my city.
For me to effect positive change and shape the city of my dream, it also very important to target the young men and women of my city, because they like me constitute about 45% of the State of Massachusetts population. Targeting the youth is very easy. Through community service organizations, churches, public and private schools, after school programs such as the Boys and Girls Club, YWCA and YMCA, Girls Incorporation, etc., programs can be instituted in these already existing facilities and structures to educate and create awareness of the issues listed in this paper. When the mindset of the youth are redirected more positively, we will all see the changes we want to see and thus the city of my dream will be fulfilled. One of the characteristics of the city of dreams which was not mention earlier is one in which youth have meaningful decision making choices as to what and how communities are set up, because they (youth) are the primary users of such facilities and they stay with these programs for years before becoming adults. So, if these facilities and structures are not well design, their come up process will be significantly affected. So, concentrating on youth led programs is one way, I can change the city in which I so desire to see coming to existence. So, empowering youth through community service activities will be one of the means through which I will help shape my city and make it a reality more sustainable to people, because they were part of the process in making it what it is.
This also goes to providing educational opportunities for the disabled to assisting the elderly folks. From assisting the homeless and hungry ones to assisting providing sound, safe and accessible healthcare to baby mothers, pregnant women, etc.

MY TRAVEL JOURNAL TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA


Introduction
I arrived in Ghana on the 5th June, 1995 with my two sisters and brother on the Buduburam refugee camp located in the Central Region of Gomoa District about 45 minutes drive away from Accra the capital of Ghana.

My mother arrived in the United States of America on the 16th March, 2004 from the Republic of Ivory Coast through the assistance of the Lutheran Immigrants and Refugee Services. During the civil war in Liberia, me, my brother and sisters were separated from our mother.

After series of interviews and Medical-Screening with the Overseas Processing Entity (OPE-Ghana) in collaboration with the Church World Services in Accra, Ghana, the Immigration and Neutralization Services of the United States of America, the International Organization For Migration (IOM) and the Lutheran Immigrants and Refugees Services (LIRS), I was approved to be resettled with my mother in the United States of America.

As such, on Monday the 11th December, A. D. 2006 marked the climax of my stay as a refugee in the Republic of Ghana and opens the new page of life to different culture, people, food, climate, and all those features that are attributed to making a new life in the US.

THE FRIST PHASE OF THE TRIP TO THE US….. London, England

I left the Buduburam Refugee Camp on the dawn of Monday, 11th December, 2006 at the precise hour of 5:00am in order to enable me undertake other important things in Accra before departing. I was accompanied by two youths of the camp who were willing to be with me all the day in Accra and Rachel. Whilst in Accra, we made a stop at the BusyInternet café in Accra located around Nkwame Nkrumah Circle one of the busiest streets in Accra city. We were there for about eight hours and finally made our last stop to the Office of the International Organization Migration office where I along with other seven (7) refugee families were appointed to be present at 2:00pm for our pre-departure preparation activities because our flight to London, England was 11:30pm that same day. However, after series of pre-departure activities at the IOM office in Accra, I was called to sign the repayment promissory note which was offered by the Resettlement Agency in the US (LIRS) to pay back funds that were spent on me during my travel to the United States within a 3 years period beginning three months after my arrival. After the signing of the promissory note, we were taken to the Kotoka International Airport at the precise hour of 5:00pm in order to check-in before boarding our flight.

After all the necessary checks were done, we were taken to Boarding Gate 2 to await our flight. At the hour of 11:00pm, British Airways Flight crew came in and headed to their flight to get ready for the pick-off. Notwithstanding, at the precise time (11:30pm) all passengers boarding British Airways Flight number B A 082731 were requested to board the flight. The BA 082731 was heading to the Heathrow Airport
( International Terminal 4) in London, England.

This was a great experience for me and other refugees benefiting from similar program to be resettled in the United States. At the Kotoka International Airport in Accra, we were fortunate to see other flights. Some of the planes we were fortunate to have seen were as follows:
Ø Lufthansa Airways
Ø Kenya Airways
Ø Ghana International Airways
Ø Virgin Nigeria Airways
Ø Ethiopian Airways
Ø South African Airways
Ø KLM
Ø Air France
Ø American Airlines
Ø Air Ivoire amongst many others that I can’t name right now.

Our flight pick-off at 11:30pm from the Kotoka International Airport and that process in itself was amazing to me. I felt more heavier for about 15 minutes and regained my normal weight. It was very much amazing and most of all adventurous. I could only see within 5 minutes the beautiful city of Accra all in bright lights of different colors. Cars, houses, buses, humans all looked to be at the same height and shape. I was able to monitor the flight speed, movements, height, wind outside and climate from the statistics that were presented frequently on the screen next to me. I felt so happy, strong and impress with this invention made by man……Airplanes. This is truly a great invention. You can not really appreciate something if you have not really tested it yourself.

Some of the cities that we flew over are as follows: Tamale- Ghana, Ouagadougou-Burkina Faso, Bamako-Mali, Tunis-Tunisia, Rome, Milan-Italy, and Paris, France. Many are countless as I can not record their names.

During the flight, I was served twice with nutritious meal some I have never ever eaten in my life. I also enjoyed the customer services on-board the British Airways. I read recent news on the United States and Great Britain.

We landed in London at the Heathrow International Airport at about 5:30pm and all necessary check-outs were done at the British Immigration and Customs officers. We were met at the airport by representatives from IOM-England who made all arrangements for our check-out process very easy and smooth.

Out of the terminal, I was amazed at the extreme cold weather that engulfed my face like the breeze from heaven. The first question that ran into my mind was whether there artificial cooling systems in the area where I was standing. Later did I know that the area that I was standing was actually out of the building, and that the coldness that I was experiencing was actually my first experience of the winter.

LYDIA in Post-War Reconstruction and Rehabilitation in Liberia







The Goals of LYDIA are to help former refugee youths heal from trauma through art and community, to assist all young people who deserve to get their education and to have dreams for the future, and to create art that allows people to feel seen and heard in the world.

LYDIA's mission is put into action through two different programs, the Women’s Scholarship Fund and Youth House. The Women’s Scholarship Fund allows otherwise resource-less former refugee girls to pay their school fees, buy uniforms, and pay for food, transportation, and housing while they are getting their education. Youth House is a home base for teens where they can take part in hip-hop, theatre, and art after-school programs, youth groups, community building programs, and AIDS awareness groups. LYDIA hopes to give a generation of children the skills and support to get back on the path of rediscovering their identity and creating possibilities for the future.

In 2006, the NYU based Fifth Project Theatre Company and Prof. Daniel Banks ran hip-hop poetry and theatre workshops with the displaced youth living on Buduburam Liberian Refugee Camp outside of Accra, Ghana. Teens gathered to learn beat-boxing skills, write poetry, and create music in giant ciphers. We met so many open and talented teens, but at every workshop, there was one teenager who kept on surprising us. Her name was Lydia Mulubah. Lydia was a powerful MC and beat-boxer, and in the male dominated atmosphere of the refugee camp, her sense of self, fearlessness, and passionate voice in poetry and art was something we were blown away by! Right before we were to head back to NY, we learned that because of Lydia's family situation, she was going to be unable to continue her education. Lydia expressed how much her education meant to her, and so we set up a scholarship fund for her through RESPECT Ghana Program Coordinator Mr. Jenkins Macedo who along with several volunteers which include Afred Kayee, RESPECT Ghana, Assistant Program Coordinator. In December of 2006 Mr. Macedo was resettled to the United States through the US Refugee Resettlement Program and Mr. Alfred Kayee became the Program Coordinator of RESPECT Ghana’s activities at the Buduburam Liberian Refugee Camp in Ghana and was also very instrumental in the continuation of Lydia’s scholarship. He also leader of the RESPECT Dramatic Arts Club that Lydia Mulubah was an active member of.

In the past two years, Lydia has been doing well in school, (she graduated from 9th grade!) but recently, the UN refugee camp was shut down. 17,000 Liberian Refugees, many who have been away from Liberia, Togo, Ivory Coast, and Sierra Leone for as long as 15 years, all have had to leave Ghana, Lydia included. Alfred is also back in Liberia, but with constant violence, high inflation of food, and nowhere to live, the situation is very challenging.

At the moment Lydia is currently in school in Liberia and Danielle Levanas a former graduate student of New York University along with other students of the Fifth Project Theatre Company and Prof. Daniel Banks were instrumental in setting up a non-profit organization in Liberia with its branch in the US soon to be able to bridge the gap in the lives of refugee youth in Liberia through the arts, education, and community services projects.

RESPECT Liberia is an emerging member of the RESPECT International networks while Liberian Youth Determination In Adversity (LYDIA) is an organization that has been registered as a non-profit community-based organization directly working with youth in Liberia. Most of the current members of LYDIA were once member of RESPECT Ghana or the RESPECT Intellectual Club and it is very great to know that they are willing to volunteer in these harsh and difficult communities to reach the lives of others. I think this is great and this can be better if we only unite our limited and scarce resources in working with youth in these communities in Liberia. I think instead of working separately as LYDIA's and RESPECT's staff members in Liberia we could either get into a partnership or unify the two organizations to maximize cost and also reduce the issues of duplicating projects. Social change in today’s societies can only be possible when we network with likeminded individuals, institutions and organizations in accomplishing our set goals. That doesn’t in anyway means that RESPECT Liberia and LYDIA are going to emerge to become one entity, but building a partnership agreement that will benefit both organizations and at the same time fulfill their set objectives. Introducing LYDIA youth to the letter exchange program that RESPECT undertake will also expose those youth to other opportunities and widens their scope of the universe from the corners of Liberia. RESPECT International, the mother organization of RESPECT Liberia is part of a global network of volunteers and organizations that have the capacity to create awareness and education globally about situations that these youth are encountering in Liberia. In unity we can achieve all that we anticipate to achieve in a very short period and our limited resources will be cost effective.

We hope that someday both the staff of LYDIA and RESPECT Liberia can realize that working together makes changes possible. I am currently working with RESPECT Ghana and RESPECT International in making sure that RESPECT Liberia start to be an active organization in Liberia instead of one that is passive. I am also a board member of LYDIA and it is a wonder how LYDIA is growing so fast.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Ellison Applauds White House Liberian Extension

Congressman Keith EllisonFor Immediate Release Contact: Rick JauertFriday, March 20, 2009 202.225.4755 or 202-309-3413 Rick.Jauert@mail.house.govEllison Applauds White House Liberian Extension Will Work for Path to Residency and CitizenshipWashington, D.C. – Congressman Keith Ellison (D-Minneapolis) welcomed President Obama’s decision today to extend Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) status by 12 months to Liberians residing legally in the United States. There are approximately 3,600 Liberians in the United States on a temporary status including more than 1,000 Minnesotans. “I am grateful that President Obama has granted our Liberian neighbors extended DED status,” Representative Ellison said. “This was the right thing to do to keep families together and it embraces the fundamental foundation of an immigrant nation.”Liberians have lived and worked in Minnesota since 1991 when their country was wracked by civil war which first made them eligible for temporary protected status. Liberians have been granted Temporary Protected Status (TPS) or Deferred Enforced Departure (DED) under President Clinton and President Bush. The Liberians are currently under DED status, which was set to expire on March 31, 2009.This past December, Congressman Ellison sent a letter to then President-Elect Obama along with 31 other Members of the House calling on the new Administration to extend DED status for all Liberians residing in the United States. In 110th Congress, Ellison authored legislation with Congressman Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) to allow Liberian Americans who were brought here under TPS to apply for citizenship.“Liberian American families have made Minnesota their home for the past eighteen years. They are our friends and neighbors; their children go to school with our children; they pay taxes and contribute to the health and wealth of our communities,” the 5th District Congressman stated.“As thrilled as I am about this decision, we have simply been given a 12-month reprieve,” said Ellison. “I plan to work with President Obama and my colleagues in Congress to enable those Liberian families who wish to apply for permanent residence and U.S. citizenship.”###Rick JauertSenior Policy Advisor and Communications DirectorCongressman Keith Ellison5th Congressional District - Minnesota202-225-4755202-225-4886 (f)rick.jauert@mail.house.govsign up for Congressman Ellison's E-newsletter "Not only will we have to repent for the sins of bad people; but we also will have to repent for the appalling silence of good people"
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

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